There have been a few bumps in the road when it comes to giving home care workers a pay hike. 

In order to attract more workers to the field, the New York state Senate’s one-house budget released last week included an additional $2-an-hour wage hike for home care workers. When added to last year’s $3-an-hour hike, home care workers would be paid $5 above minimum wage – which is critical according to advocates – because New York faces a home care worker crisis.

The state Assembly’s one-house budget also hikes home care wages, stating that the wage rate for home care workers must remain at least $3 above the minimum wage rate “so that it may continue to rise jointly with the rest of the State.”

Both of these proposals are attempts to provide traditionally low-paid home care workers with a real pay hike that will both keep home care workers on the job and entice other workers into the field.

Last year’s $3 pay hike over two years was less than advocates had pushed for, but, they argued, it moved the wages of home care workers above the minimum wage, which is key to worker retention.

Unfortunately, many of the home care workers never saw the raises they were granted by the Legislature; something Syracuse-area Democratic Sen. Rachel May promises to fix.

“Last year, we put a lot of money into raising home care wages…but a lot of the money flowed to the big managed long-term care companies, which are basically insurance. And then they allocate the money to the providers, the actual agencies that hire the workers. And they were giving them raises of 25 cents or 50 cents, at the same time the providers had to pay an initial $2 increase we got last year,” May told Capital Tonight.

The result was that home care agencies were reducing hours and even laying off workers — the opposite of the intended effect of the wage hike legislation.

“The point is to get more home care workers so more people can stay out of nursing homes (and) more family members can keep their jobs instead of having to quit work,” May explained. 

This year, May included language in her “Fair Pay for Home Care Act” that specifies that any extra money the Legislature allocates will flow directly to the providers who hire the workers.

The bill also sets the wages of home care workers to 150% of the minimum wage.

“But we’re not there yet,” May said.

However, there are other provisions in the bill that are critical.

For example, there will also be enforcement to ensure that workers actually receive the money the Legislature intends for them.

“One of the surprises for me was, I asked the comptroller’s office to audit these contracts that were going out, and they told me that they weren’t allowed to because they are proprietary,” May said.  

May’s “Fair Pay for Home Care Act” now also includes language stating that the comptroller may indeed audit home care contracts to ensure wage hikes are “going where (they) should."

Another issue tucked into this year’s executive budget that significantly minimizes last year’s victory for workers is the governor’s proposed hike in the minimum wage, something home care advocates have described as “one step forward and two steps back."

While home care workers aren’t opposed to hiking the minimum wage, May said, it’s critical that they are paid more than that so they don’t quit the home care field to take easier work for the same rate of pay.

“Last year what we succeeded in doing (with the $3 raise) was setting home care wages above the minimum wage,” May said.

But this year’s minimum wage proposal could erase that financial cushion for home care workers, many of whom are on public assistance.

According to Mercer’s “2021 External Healthcare Labor Market Analysis,” New York and California will have the largest health care labor shortages affecting workers at the lower end of the income spectrum, particularly home care workers.